Members of the academic community, civil society and the business community are urging the leaders of the region to lobby for a postponement of the December 31 deadline for the signing of the economic partnership agreement (EPA).

The EPA is the successor pact to the non-reciprocal preferential trade regimes of the Cotonou Agreement and its predecessor, the Lomé Convention, which have governed European Union (EU)/African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) trade for more than three decades. But, due to pressure from the World Trade Organisation (WTO), the agreement is being phased out and replaced by the EPA.

In an open letter sent to the regional leaders on Wednesday, the group said: "We believe that every effort should be made as a matter of great urgency, at the highest political level, to initiate action towards a postponement of the December 2007 deadline signing of the economic partnership agreement."

The group said this should be done by directly alerting the WTO, as well as by direct intervention with individual EU states, the EU parliament and other concerned interests in Europe.

The letter was sent to regional leaders by Ambassador Havelock Brewster, honorary professor at the Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies at the University of the West Indies; Norman Girvan, professorial research fellow at the Institute of International Relations at the UWI; James Moss-Solomon, businessman, and Judith Wedderburn, Coalition for Community Participation in Governance.

Full public disclosure needed

According to the group, the proposed EPA would have far-reaching impact and lasting consequences for the development prospects of the region and for this reason it was necessary for full public disclosure of the proposed draft.

"We should be mindful of the fact that since the signing of the Cotonou Agreement, there have been unanticipated events that have made it much more difficult for the CARIFORUM countries," said the group.

"These events include the tremendous increase in the price of energy and food for most countries, the long delay and continuing failure to conclude the WTO Doha Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, reductions of the price of sugar exports to the EU, and the drastic depreciation of the exchange rate for the U.S. dollar, in which most of our exports are priced," the letter further stated.

Regional leaders encouraged to put off signing partnership agreement